OFFICE MANAGEMENT SKILLS REQUIRED OF OFFICE TECHNOLOGY AND MANAGEMENT GRADUATES IN EBONYI STATE CIVIL SERVICE

Abstract

This study was carried out to determine office management skills required of Office Technology and Management graduates for effective performance in Ebonyi State Civil Service.  Two research questions were raised to guide the study while one null hypothesis was tested at 0.05 level of significance.  The study adopted descriptive survey design.  The entire population of 166 supervisors who supervise Office Technology and Management staff in Ebonyi State civil service were used for the study.  Data were collected for the study through the administration of a validated questionnaire on the respondents.  The reliability of the instrument was established using Cronbach Alpha correlation formula.  The overall reliability coefficient obtained was 0.92.  Mean statistic was used to answer the research questions while t-test statistic was used to test the hypothesis at 0.05 level of significance.  The findings of the study revealed that human relations skills and communication skills were highly required of office technology and management graduate for effective performance in Ebonyi State civil service.  It was concluded that to be professionally relevance and competitive in the face of technological innovations of this era, graduates of office technology and management programme must be exposed to the identified skills to acquaint themselves with the trend of modern office work requirements.  It was recommended among others that these office skills should be emphasized at different levels of training of OTM students in order to endow them with relevant skills they are required to have in their work places. 

Keywords: Supervisors, Office Technology and Management graduates, Office Management Skills